204
9 The Politics for a Fairer Bioeconomy
mostly continue to be blind spots of governance analyses. Assessments of biofuel
social impacts have hardly examined links to the institutional and political contexts
in place. Although scientists and multilateral agencies for years have pointed out
the high stakes of large-scale biofuel production, its expansion continues unabated
and mostly unchanged, and now broader bioeconomy strategies are emerging and
seeking to build on top of the existing sectors. To draw lessons from experience thus
far, this book has asked why certain biofuel production patterns have prevailed at
the expense of others.
This chapter draws on the in-depth assessments in this book to answer that question. It will also provide recommendations for institutional redesign and further
research. The next section discusses some main conclusions; it characterizes the
social sustainability of prevailing biofuel production systems, delves into bioeconomy governance politics, explains how agents operate and why these new
sectors remain a non-regime at the international level. The chapter also expounds
on the relevance of access and allocation patterns to understand governance and
why certain (unsustainable) strategies have prevailed. Later, the chapter discusses
how bioeconomy strategies can become more equitable, including specific policy
design recommendations and governance lessons. It ends with recommendations for
further research and some final considerations on adequately taking on board social
dimensions for a fairer bioeconomy.
9.2 Unraveling the Politics of Bioeconomy Governance
9.2.1 The Prevalence of Conservative and Unsustainable
Agri-Food-Biomass Systems
Although the various biofuels and bioeconomy products are diverse from a technical standpoint, their prevailing production systems have been remarkably similar
and rather conservative. For one, biofuels have brought about moderate innovation
to energy systems: they maintain conventional fuel distribution and transportation
infrastructure while replacing oil products with renewable energy. However, they
have merely added technologies and new markets to pre-existing agricultural systems
upstream in the production chain.
Agricultural or feedstock cultivation systems have undergone little to no structural changes. They have also maintained nearly all their pre-existing environmental
impacts, skewed power relations, and uneven allocation patterns. Agri-food systems
may have become agri-fuel—sometimes agri-food-fuel or, more generally, agri-foodbiomass—systems. They are about to increasingly become biomass-based “value
webs,” where multiple chains coexist to deliver a plethora of goods (Virchow et al.
2016; Scheiterle et al. 2018). Nevertheless, there has generally been no change
regarding who owns, does, or gets what. (The “what” has somewhat changed, but the
“who” has not. The winners and losers remain mostly the same.) The expansion of
9 The Politics for a Fairer Bioeconomy
mostly continue to be blind spots of governance analyses. Assessments of biofuel
social impacts have hardly examined links to the institutional and political contexts
in place. Although scientists and multilateral agencies for years have pointed out
the high stakes of large-scale biofuel production, its expansion continues unabated
and mostly unchanged, and now broader bioeconomy strategies are emerging and
seeking to build on top of the existing sectors. To draw lessons from experience thus
far, this book has asked why certain biofuel production patterns have prevailed at
the expense of others.
This chapter draws on the in-depth assessments in this book to answer that question. It will also provide recommendations for institutional redesign and further
research. The next section discusses some main conclusions; it characterizes the
social sustainability of prevailing biofuel production systems, delves into bioeconomy governance politics, explains how agents operate and why these new
sectors remain a non-regime at the international level. The chapter also expounds
on the relevance of access and allocation patterns to understand governance and
why certain (unsustainable) strategies have prevailed. Later, the chapter discusses
how bioeconomy strategies can become more equitable, including specific policy
design recommendations and governance lessons. It ends with recommendations for
further research and some final considerations on adequately taking on board social
dimensions for a fairer bioeconomy.
9.2 Unraveling the Politics of Bioeconomy Governance
9.2.1 The Prevalence of Conservative and Unsustainable
Agri-Food-Biomass Systems
Although the various biofuels and bioeconomy products are diverse from a technical standpoint, their prevailing production systems have been remarkably similar
and rather conservative. For one, biofuels have brought about moderate innovation
to energy systems: they maintain conventional fuel distribution and transportation
infrastructure while replacing oil products with renewable energy. However, they
have merely added technologies and new markets to pre-existing agricultural systems
upstream in the production chain.
Agricultural or feedstock cultivation systems have undergone little to no structural changes. They have also maintained nearly all their pre-existing environmental
impacts, skewed power relations, and uneven allocation patterns. Agri-food systems
may have become agri-fuel—sometimes agri-food-fuel or, more generally, agri-foodbiomass—systems. They are about to increasingly become biomass-based “value
webs,” where multiple chains coexist to deliver a plethora of goods (Virchow et al.
2016; Scheiterle et al. 2018). Nevertheless, there has generally been no change
regarding who owns, does, or gets what. (The “what” has somewhat changed, but the
“who” has not. The winners and losers remain mostly the same.) The expansion of